Page 75 of Ravaged Wolf
“Yes. More than anything.”
“Then you’ll stay. We’re free now, girl. You have self-determination. The rules, what’s possible and impossible, all of that is all in your head. They put that shit there, downloaded the program straight to your orbitofrontal cortex. You’ve got to wipe it from your system.” She makes a trippy whoosh sound. Her gold eyes are strangely glowy.
“Have you been sampling the product?”
“Nope. This is one hundred percent punch-drunk exhaustion.”
I understand the feeling. My eyes feel like sandpaper, and my arms are dead weight. “We’ve only got two hours left before dawn.”
“Two hours is one million years.”
She’s absolutely right. I don’t remember it being this hard with Abertha, but Abertha has an energy about her that does a weird thing to time. Even if you’re just having tea or weeding the garden, it feels like a recital or a do-or-die match, not that kind of pressure, but the hyperawareness and sense that every moment counts. Maybe it’s the magic. It follows her around like her own personal atmosphere and raises the hair on your arms.
“You know what—” Nia says, perking up. “The witch didn’t say anything about this being afemalejob, did she?”
“She did not.” Though I have a feeling she’d object to the very idea.
We both swivel our heads toward Pritchard’s sleeping wolf. “Watch this,” Nia says.
She reaches out her free hand, wraps her fingers around air again, and yanks. Pritchard’s wolf whines, lifts a folded ear, and opens one grumpy eye to glare at Nia balefully.
She draws her arms back like she’s reeling him in. He lifts his other ear so he can glower at her with both bleary eyes. The sleeping girls shift.
Pritchard’s wolf slowly wriggles away, so their heads are laid gently on the soft grass. They immediately snuggle together. Pritchard’s wolf stands, shakes himself off, and with a final disgruntled rumble, trots into the trees.
For a second, I think he’s abandoning us, but then he stumbles back to the clearing in human form, wearing a pair of rather undersized gym shorts. He tromps straight over, scratching his bare abs. I see why Nia has so much experience tugging his leash.
“What’s up?” he asks, coming to stand next to the fire. He sniffs the dragon’s tongue laden air and then leans closer to Nia and breathes in the scent of her hair as a chaser.
“My arm’s killing me,” she says.
“Okay. Do I just stir?” he asks. No complaint. Not even a hint of patient suffering on his groggy face. The males at Old Den are so different from the males I grew up with, they might as well be a different species.
“Yeah. But you have to do it in time. Like this.” Nia grabs his hand, places it over hers, and stirs, counting off the beats. The sleep clears from Pritchard’s eyes, and he leans forward so that his chest presses against Nia’s back.
“Like this?” he asks, tucking his chin into the crook of her neck so he can whisper in her ear.
I glance away into the trees, my cheeks heating.
“Yeah,” Nia says breathily. “You got it?”
“I got it,” Pritchard practically purrs.
“How long do you think you can go?” Nia asks, her voice higher than I’ve ever heard it.
Pritchard’s voice drops lower. “How long do you need me to go?”
“Can you go all night?”
“You know I can.”
“Bet.” Nia ducks away, laughing, her voice back to its normal huskiness. “Izzy and I are just going to take a little nap then. Wake us up if you need a break.”
She collapses beside me, and while I’m thinking about how impossible it’ll be to fall asleep on the cold, hard ground, and how much it’ll suck to get woken up if I manage to drift off, I pass out and don’t wake up until Trevor gently shakes my shoulder as the sun is breaking over the hills to the east.
“Good morning, beautiful,” he says as he helps me to my feet.
And even though my arms feel like lead, my back is soaking wet from dew, and my bones ache, a little burst of happiness flares in my chest. He came.
